Existing tomatillo varieties are suitable for manual harvesting, which often requires growers to send crews into the field multiple times. It is known that labor cost for manual harvest for tomatillo is much higher than labor cost for mechanical harvest. A tomatillo plant must possess specific attributes for mechanical harvesting. Currently, there are no genotypes that have been specifically bred for mechanical harvesting for many of the commercially important tomatillo varieties. Existing varieties have indeterminate growth habit resulting in continuous fruit set.
Tomatillos are used in Mexican cuisine. Tomatillos are purchased at mature green ripe stage, a stage were fruits are highest in acids and lower in sugars. Fruit are then de-husked and boiled with salt and other spices until soft. Once soft they are pureed into a salsa with hot green chiles. Although households and restaurants are the greatest manufacturers and consumers of tomatillo green salsa, a growing processing industry does exist. Processors buy fruits from growers or suppliers and then process. Typically, processors buy tomatillo fruits without the husk on the fruit, requiring the grower or middle market to remove the husk. This step adds cost to the tomatillo producers.
The present invention invention provides growers with two immediate benefits. There is indeed a need for having concentrated set varieties producing more yield in less time and being machine harvestable. Grower inputs and fruits exposure to pests are reduced. Moreover, there is also a need to have tomatillos allowing growers to grow tomatillos directly for processors. Fruits can be machine harvested without the husk, reducing the cost to de-husk the fruit before sending them to the market.
The current invention meets a long felt need for a tomatillo plant ideotype suitable for machine harvesting and provides new tomatillo plants useful for mechanical harvesting combined with other highly desirable agronomic traits.